Ventilating railway-cars



(No Model.)

A. B. HARRIS.

VENTILATING RAILWAY CARS.

No. 388,865. Patented Sept. 4, 1888 m maw.

NITED rnfrns Parent tries.

AZARIAH' B. HARRIS, ()F SPRINGFIELD, MASSACHUSETTS.

VENTILATING RAI LWAY=CARS.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 388,865, dated fieptember 4, 1888 Application filed October 11, 1886. Serial No.215f63. (No model.)

To aZZ whom it may concern:

Be it known that l, AZARIAH B. HARRIS, a citizen of the United States, residing at Spring field, in the county of Hampden and State of Massachusetts, have invented new and useful Improvements in Ventilating Railway-Oars, of which the following is a specification.

This invention relates to improvements in means for ventilating railway-cars, and pertains to improvements in means for excluding cinder-s and like matter from the air-passage between the upper and lower roof of doubleroofed cars and to an improved window constructiou, having for its object the exclusion of said cinders and other matter which is car ried by or in the air from the interior of the car when the window is open.

In the drawings forming part of this specification, Figure l is a perspective view of one end of a car-body having applied thereto ventilating and c-imlcr-exclnding devices embodying my improvements. Fig. 2 is a perspective view of the window of the car. Fig. 3 is a vertical section of the lower end of the window. Fig. 4 is a side elevation of one end of the car-roof. Fig. 5 is a perspective view of a detail of the construction hereinafter described.

The portion of a car-body, 2, herein shown embodies substantially the doubleroof construction shown in my patent of February 2, 1886, No. 385,448, which provides for an air space between the upper and lower roofs of the car for ventilating purposes, the air rushing in at either end of said air-space, according to the direction in which the car is running,suitable ventilating-pipes being fixed in the lower roof or the ceiling of the oar,where by air may pass from said passage into the car. One description of said ventilatingpipes S is shown in dotted lines in Fig. 4, which permits the air to enter either end thereof and conveys it downward into the car directly through the ceiling or lower roof of r the latter and another description and the preferable one, 25, is shown in Fig. 1, partly in full and partly in dotted. lines, the roof of the car in that figure being partly broken away to show the location of the hood of the ventilator in the airpassage between the two roofs, said ventilator 25 being constructed as detween the inner and outer walls of the side ofthe car and terminates beneath the floor of the latter, as shown.

To provide for more conveniently applying the below-described cinder-excluding devices to the end of the roof of the car across said air-passage therein, the end of the upper roof, 3, is extended about to the end of the ordinary curved dust-deflecting hood, 19, which extends over the platform 20 of the car. The said cinder-excluding devices, which are applied to the roof of the ear, consist of either one or two wire screens, at and 5, and when two are used, as shown, the inner one, 4, is preferably the finer of the two and is placed within the air-passage between the roofs, trans versely across the same, a little removed from the end of the roof, as shown in Figs. 1 and 4, said screen being attached to a suitable frame, which is fitted in said air-space in such a manner that the air that enters the latter must pass through said inner screen, the latter being made of any suitable wire-cloth. Across the end of the roof of the car, and attached thereto in any suitable manner, is said coarser wire-cloth screen, 5, and the latter extends from the upper edge of the roof nearly to the lower edge of said hood 19, and to the lower edge of the screen 5 is hung a door, 6, made preferably of sheet metal, which is cap-a ble of being swung to open more or less to leave an airspace between the lower edge of the screen 5 and the lower edge of the hood 19, a spring-catch, 7, or other suitable fastening device being applied to the ear to hold said door in a partly open or shut position, as may be desirable. The operation of said two screens to prevent to any considerable extent the entrance of cinders and like matter into said ventilating-passage between the roofs of the car is as follows: Cinders are driven by the rush of air against the outer screen, 5, and pass through the meshes of the latter into the air-space between the two screens, and most of them fall onto the curved hood 19 behind the screen 5 and fall down back of the door 6, while other and finer cinders are blown against the rear screen, 4, which is of sufficient fineness to arrest nearly, if not quite, all of the cinders, and upon striking said finer screen they fall ontothe curved surface of said hood below and drop behind said door 6 with the coarser ones before mentioned, and the air,

almost entirely clear of cinders, passes throughsaid finer screen into the airspace between the roofs oftheear. By meansofthespring-eatches 7, whose sides are corrugated, as shown, to engage with the ends of the door 6, the latter is held slightly open, as shown in Figs. 1 and 4, but not so far as to relieve the space between the screens of the needed air-pressure which is requisite to cause the proper flow of air through the inner screen, 4, into the ventilating-passage between the roofs, and the door 6 V is adapted to be so opened as to regulate said air-pressure. The said cinders which fall on the hood 19 back of the door 6 drop between the latter and the hood. The rush of air through said screens into the air-passage between the roofs of the ear causes more or less air-pressure in said passage, and the air naturally seeks an outlet from the latter, and to make the best use thereof for supplying fresh air to the car and for clearing it of any cinders that may remain therein after it has passed through said two screens the ventilator 25 is employed, the hood of which is located in said air-passage, as shown in Fig. 1, and into which the said air is forced, and from thence is driven through the tubular portion thereof downward, and a large portion thereof passes through said side opening in the ventilatorpipe into the car, while the cinders that may be in the air are driven past said opening through the lower end of the ventilator-tube outside of the car, all as fully described and set forth in said patent of July 20, 1886, above referred to. Thus by means of the said screens and the ventilator 25 the interior of the car is supplied with any desired quantity of pure air by using as many of the ventilators 25 in connection with the air-space between the roofs as may be necessary or desirable to accomplish that end.

The window shown in Figs. 1, 2, and 3 has a sash constructed with the usual top and side rails, the latter being designated by 9, a bottom rail, 17, and an intermediate transverse rail, 15, having a projecting water-table thereon, as shown, and in the space incloscd by said rail, the side rails, 9, and the top rail is set the usual glass, 10, and within the space between said intermediate rail, 15, and the bottom rail, 17, are fixed one or two wirescreens, 12 and 16, the latter being the finer and the inside one. The outer screen, 12, has its lower edge attached to a cross-bar, 22,.

which is attached to the side rails of the sash a little above the lower rail, 17, thereby 1eaving an opening, 18, between said cross-bar and the latter, as shown in Figs. 2 and-3, the up per edge of said bottom rail being inclined, as shown, to facilitate the escape of cinders, dust, or water therefrom. It will be seen that air passes more freely through the outer than the inner screen, owing to the resistance that the latter finer one offers to the air. The width of said opening 18 is adjusted to such proportions as will cause sufficient air-current outwardly through said opening to carry off the cinders which pass through the outer screen, but not to prevent such air-pressure between the screens as will seeurea proper flow of air through the inner screen into the car.

In Fig. 1 the side of the car below the window therein is shown broken away, disclosing therein a pocket or chamber to receive the lower end of said window in which the screens 12 and 16 are set. The window shown in Fig. l is in a closed position and slides in the usual window-frame and through a slotted windowsill, 23, and when the window is opened to admit air and to exclude cinders or other matter it is lifted up sufficiently to bring the screenbearing portion thereof above said windowsill and to carry the inclined edge of the bottom rail of the sash also slightly above said sill, and in cars it is desirable that the win dow be so arranged that it cannot be lifted any higher, in order that no cinders be allowed to enter by the window. Atube, 14, extends from the under side of the car be tween the walls thereof and communicates with the bottom of said chamber under the window, for the purpose of carrying oft' any water that may enter it from around the window; but the water-table 26, which projects over the window-sill when the window is down, serves generally to prevent water in any quantity from entering said chamber. The said window made with one screen insteadof two, as above suggestedthat is to say, with the outside shorter screen, 12, left offprovides a movable sash combining therein a glass and a screen-covered opening, which is adapted to supersede the use of independent or separate screen-frames for the windows of cars or houses.

The operation of the above-described window-in excluding cinders and similar matter from the car when the window is raised, as above set forth, is as follows: Said window being raised up for the purposes of car-ventilation, or, in other words, to admit air to the ear or to allow it to escape therefrom, accord ing to the directions which air-currents may take, if an air-current tends to rush into the ear, any cinders that said current may contain are driven against said coarser outer screen, 12, of the window,and such as are too large to pass through said screen fall outside of the same,;and those that do pass through are either'driven against the inner finer screen,

IIO

16, or fall before reaching the latter and drop through the opening 18 between the lower edge of the outer screen and the npperinclined edge of the bottom sash-rail, 17. Thus no cinders can enter the car with the air which passes through the inner screen, except such as may be very fine, and nearly all of them fall before reaching the inner screen and drop through the opening 18, as aforesaid, the result of which is that few or no cinders enter the car through the screen-protected portion oi. said window when the latter is opened, as above described.

If preferred, the outer screen, 5, at the end of the car-roof may be hinged by its upper edge to the latter, instead of having the door 6 hinged thereto, and thereby be made capable of having its lower edge swung slightly away from the hood and of being secured in such position by the spring-catches 7.

What I claim as my invention is- 1. In a car having a main and a supplementary roof, whereby a ventilating air-passage is formed between the two, two screens secured across the end of said passage near and at the end of the latter, the outer screen having an adjustable opening at its lower edge, substantially as set forth.

2. A sash for a window integrally constructed with two separated openings therein, one above the other, the upper of said openings having the usual glass fixed therein, the lower of said openings having outer and inner screens, substantially as described, fixed therein, said inner screen wholly filling said lower opening, and said outer screen only partially filling said lower opening in the sash, substantially as set forth.

3. A sash for a window integrally coir structed with two separated openings therein, one above the other, the upper of said openings having the usual glass fixed therein and the lower of said openings having a wire screen fixed therein, combined with the wall of a car having a chamber below the windowsill thereof to receive the screcnbearing end of said sash, substantially as set forth.

AZARIAH B. HARRIS.

lVitnesses: 7

WM. H. CHAPIN, G. M. CHAMBERLMN. 

